Live 2.1

Live 2.1 is an interactive multitrack recorder and arranger with a split personality: It operates both as a traditional multitrack audio recorder (with real-time time stretching and pitch shifting) and as a remixing tool that lets you arrange and trigger individual audio clips.

In the Arrange view, you record and assemble audio as you would with any sequencer. Like ACID, Live lets you drag and drop files from a browser into your arrangement and then encodes the audio files you record, so that everything stays in sync as your project's tempo changes.

The Session view looks and behaves like a standard software mixer (complete with real-time effects) and also doubles as a launching pad for audio clips. Each column in the Session view represents one track in the project, but the columns contain clip-holding slots, arranged in rows. You can trigger individual clips or a row of clips with the mouse or via user-assignable keyboard commands, then store the results as part of an arrangement.

Live ships with an impressive array of dance-oriented loops to get you started, and it can open and encode prerecorded audio files from other sources. Once you get the hang of triggering the clips, you may never go back to traditional arranging.

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